


Switching Places

by a_nonny_moose



Series: My AU [59]
Category: Markiplier Egos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-23
Updated: 2017-08-23
Packaged: 2018-12-18 21:16:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11882979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_nonny_moose/pseuds/a_nonny_moose
Summary: Dark and Bim try to swap places. Inspired by kitkat1003 on tumblr!





	1. Chapter 1

“Remind me why we’re doing this, again?” Bim was looking up, eyelids flickering in fear, as Dark lined the bottom of his eyes with eyeliner. Being this close to Dark was terrifying, and Bim held his breath. Dark’s aura was ringing in his ears. He didn’t know why he agreed to this.

“Because it’ll be _fun_ ,” Dark chuckled, capping his pencil, and stepped back. 

“Since when have you liked ‘fun’?” Bim said, looking at himself in the mirror in Dark’s office.

Dark leaned against his desk, eyeing Bim up and down. “I’m _bored_ , Trimmer,” he said, rolling his eyes. “Wilford has _his_ fun–” Dark paused, mulling over the last time Wilford filled the Googles’ room with bubbles, “–and I have _mine_.”

Bim shuddered a little, involuntary. “Okay. Fine. What now?”

Dark stepped closer, one fluid movement, and Bim froze. With oddly gentle hands, Dark reached up to ruffle Bim’s hair, raking it forward. Bim winced internally at the feeling of Dark’s hands, ice-cold, against his head. 

Dark leaned back to admire his work. “One more thing.” He smiled, more of a leer, and it was really all that Bim could do not to run out of the room. 

Dark leaned in, as if about to kiss Bim, reached towards his face, and took Bim’s glasses. 

Bim took a shaky breath and made an impressive attempt at sounding cool. “I can’t see, Dark.”

Dark threw Bim a small box– Bim, dumbfounded, caught it and held it up to his face, squinting. “Contacts?”

“Try them on.”  


It took Bim fifteen minutes to wrestle the impossible plastic disks into his eyes. Sweating, cursing, and crying profusely, he blinked the world into focus once again. 

Dark looked far too satisfied with himself. “Perfect.”

Bim looked between him and Dark, wearing his glasses, in the mirror. Dark was still surrounded by the smoke of his aura, still paler than any human should’ve been. Bim fought to keep a smile off of his face, trying to look as brooding as possible, and flipped his hair.

Dark scowled. “I do _not_ do that.” He reached up to brush his fringe out of his face and froze, narrowing his eyes. 

Bim stifled a laugh. “We have to fix that.” Tentatively, Bim took a step towards Dark– before he could move any closer, Dark had already swept his hair back.

Now,  _that_ was disturbing. It was as if someone had put a black-and-white filter on a mirror.

With that thought, a flaw in Dark’s plan presented itself. “Dark,” Bim said, brow furrowed, “You’re still–well, I mean–”

Dark snapped his fingers.

Quickly, horribly, Dark’s aura started to swarm around Bim. As it did, Bim watched in terror as color flooded back into Dark’s face. If it had ever been there in the first place, that was. 

A beat passed, Dark looking down at himself, Bim looking horrified. 

Dark raised his head, smiled, and Bim nearly screamed. 

It was downright _weird_ , how well Dark could seem _normal._  His eyes practically sparkled, and the smile on his face reached from ear to ear. Without his _literal_ personal storm cloud, fringe, or brooding expression, Dark could very well pass for Bim, or better yet, Mark.

God, he almost looked _human_.

Bim was so distracted, looking at Dark, that he didn’t notice Dark’s aura circling him, draining color and warmth from his skin– It wasn’t until Bim reached up to push imaginary glasses up his nose and fringe out of his eyes that he saw how pale his hand was, the cold touch of his own fingers. 

“You’ll get used to it,” Dark said, smirking, watching carefully.   


“Wh– How–”  


“She’ll listen to you,” Dark said, looking almost affectionately at the swirling smoke. The clouds seemed to whirl around Bim in response, and Dark chuckled. “At least, for today.”

“I– Wh– _She?!”_  


Dark spun his finger in a circle, teasing, and the aura surrounded Bim entirely. By the time the smoke cleared, Dark was gone, and Bim was alone in Dark’s office with an aura that wasn’t his.

* * *

Dark stepped out into the hallway, for once without the ringing of his aura accompanying him. It was jarring, he’d admit, facing the world without the comforting pressure on his shoulders, the protective wisps of smoke at the corners of his vision.

Instead, today, he stood with Bim’s show of confidence stiffening his spine, charisma leaking out of his smile.

It was an effort, but Dark was more than excited. This was going to be–

“TRIMMER!!”  


It took Dark a moment to register that Wilford was, in fact, yelling at him. He whirled around, smile already in place. “Hey, Wil–”

Wilford stomped over, fuming, pink dust trailing dangerously in his wake. “Don’t ‘hey’ me, Bim, I _told_  you to hang those lights _two hours_  ago, where have you–”

Wilford, Dark knew, was the only one who would catch the switch. Wilford paused, studying “Bim’s” face closer. 

“–wait, is something…”  


Dark smiled as brightly as he could, right in Wilford’s face. “What lights?” he asked, cheerfully. 

Wilford, successfully derailed, went red again. “Get your ass to the studio, now.”

It was all Dark could do not to summon his aura and whisk Wilford into oblivion as he stalked away, towards Dark’s office. How _dare_  Wilford speak to _him_ like that, _Darkiplier_ , the very _soul_  of the channel, the thing that kept them all _alive_ –

It was a moment before Dark realized that the ringing in his ears wasn’t his aura, but his own rage. 

* * *

Bim stood nervously in the middle of Dark’s office, fidgeting with his hair. Dark’s aura was too oppressive, weighing him down, heart-squeezingly cold. He didn’t know how Dark could stand this, the constant, threatening flicker of tendrils around him. Bim flinched a few times, seeing and feeling the coils of smoke circle around him, like a hungry dog that’s been warned not to eat, but waiting for a command. 

Before Bim could center himself, there was a knock on the door. Bim took a deep breath, pushing his hair to the side one last time. He was a performer, after all, and this was showtime.

“Come in.”  


Wilford barged in even before Bim had said the words, looking ready to pounce. Bim had to force himself not to flinch back, reminding himself: he was Dark, today, and Dark didn’t take any shit from Wilford. Not the way Bim did.

Bim, emboldened, smoothed his suit and put on a Dark-worthy leer. “To what do I owe the pleasure?” he drawled. Bim noted with satisfaction the way that Dark’s aura seemed to respond to his words, snapping to attention, reaching out to drain Wilford of the red in his face, the pink of his mustache. 

“You’ve been distracting Bim,” Wilford accused, waving away the smoke. “I needed him _two hours_  ago, and who _knows_  what you’ve been ‘up to’ in here–”  


Wilford paused for breath, and Bim, catching Wilford’s implication, felt a blush rise to his face. “For your information,” Bim stuttered, trying to regain his composure, “we were–”

“Oh my god,” Wilford said, starting to laugh. “You _were_ , weren’t you?”  


“I–I–” Bim floundered, losing what little confidence he’d had as Wilford began to howl with laughter. His own aura started escaping him in embarrassed sparks of purple, barely concealed by the borrowed miasma. 

Dark’s aura jumped forward at Wilford, a dog off its leash, snapping and biting. Wilford screamed, Bim screamed, and the room went black.

* * *

Wilford’s eyes flickered open to see “Dark” staggering back, clutching his desk for support, color flooding back into his face, purple pooling around his feet. “Bim” was in the doorway, suspiciously pale, on a knee, crooning at–

“Is that a dog?” Wilford sat up, head spinning. 

“Dark” looked at him, terrified, and Wilford suddenly understood. “Darky,” Wilford said, turning to “Bim,” “This is the best idea you’ve ever had.”

The real Dark looked up, chuckling. He was kneeling next to a gigantic black dog, whose coat seemed to sparkle like the galaxy itself. As Wilford and Bim watched, he patted the dog’s head gently, whispering words to her in what seemed to be an ancient language of disconnected syllables. The dog blinked up at him, glowing red eyes and glistening fangs, all hulking muscle, but gentle at his touch. 

After a moment, the giant dog and Dark stood– he stroked her ears one last time, and she faded into smoke that curled around Dark’s shoulders once again, the mist that both Will and Bim could recognize as his aura.   


Wilford shook his head, and Bim decided not to ask. Dark smiled coolly, waiting for one of them to speak. The tendrils of miasma around him were now almost as recognizable as a wagging tail, and the ringing like a dog whistle in the distance. 

Finally, Wilford broke the silence. “So, switching places, huh?”

Dark eyed Wilford critically before breaking into a grin. “Switching places.”

* * *

Wilford led “Dark” and “Bim” into the kitchen, and they made a beeline for their next victim.

“Hey, Doc!”  



	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What about the others? Some notes.

-Dr. Iplier doesn’t notice until “Bim” trips him, cruelly, and “Dark” is the first one to help him up, patting him down carefully, aura hanging back in distaste. When Wilford explains, he laughs uncomfortably and avoids them for the rest of the day. He doesn’t need the extra confusion just now. 

-The Googles are too literal to pick up on the switch right away. One of them’s black and white, the other’s bouncy and positive– they don’t need much more than that. It’s Google_G that gets suspicious first, when “Dark” flinches one too many times and “Bim” laughs a little too genuinely when Oliver drops his welding torch on his foot. When Oliver turns to wave the torch in “Bim’s” face, it’s Dark’s aura that leaps forward to get in between them. The Googles shake their heads and turn back to their work, and Google_G makes a note to upgrade their Ego-recognition software. 

-The Host can only hear their voices and feel their movements around the office, and he knows that _something_  is wrong, but he’s not quite sure what it is. “Dark” is talking to him a little too kindly, and “Bim” is strangely stand-off-ish. It takes him too long, far too long, to work out that the ringing of Dark’s aura is accompanying the wrong voice. When he figures it out, realizes that _Bim_ , his _friend,_ is complicit in fooling him, he shuts himself in his room. Despite Bim’s tears and Wilford’s apologies, he doesn’t emerge until Dark himself comes down with a short bow and a curt, “Sorry.” Even so, the distrust follows him around like a storm cloud, and he double checks that every Ego he talks to is the Right Ego for weeks on end. 


	3. Chapter 3

-Mark can immediately see that “Bim’s” cheeks are more sunken, his eyes lined with dark circles that aren’t actually makeup. “Dark” is avoiding his eye, aura swirling behind instead of around him. Something is wrong, and Mark knows as soon as “Bim” tries to talk to him that it’s really Dark– which begs the question, did Dark do something bad to Bim? What happened? The real Bim comes over a bit shyly, aura still snapping at his heels, and gives Mark a smile. After some reassurance, Mark thinks that it’s hilarious.

-Tyler is as literal as the Googles are, and doesn’t normally pay much attention to the Egos except to make sure they haven’t broken anything. “Bim” sidles up to him, eyes wide and innocent, and it takes Tyler far too long to realize that “Bim’s” hand is resting on his thigh, their noses almost touching– Mark, standing next to “Dark,” ruins the moment by laughing. Tyler immediately looks over at Mark and “Dark,” takes a moment to restrain himself from punching “Bim” in the face, and stalks out of the room. He laughs when they explain the joke later, but Bim is embarrassed for him.

-Ethan’s close to Bim, the sweetheart, and seeks him out later that day. “Bim” is so tired from being cheery all day that he snaps at him after one too many questions. Ethan, never one to back down, snaps back. Dark forgets who he’s pretending to be and rears up at Ethan, bits of his aura rising in his hands. Ethan, to his credit, realizes what’s happening as “Bim’s” eyes flash black, and he bolts. Outside the room, he finds “Dark” and runs straight into him for a hug. Bim, shocked, works out what must’ve happened and returns the gesture. Once Ethan’s recovered, they work on pranking the others.

-Amy settles down next to “Bim” and immediately starts asking him all sorts of questions about the latest video they’ve been collaborating on. Dark knows none of the terminology and besides, being this close to a ray of sunshine is making him physically sick. Bim walks in just in time, and “Bim” has never been so happy to see “Dark.” Amy’s suspicious, of course, but this is one instance where Dark isn’t leering at her and both of the boys are at her mercy, so she takes it in stride. 

-Kathryn isn’t fooled for a second. “Dark” walks into the room and she almost laughs; Bim’s so confused, why would anyone laugh at Dark? But Kathryn just shakes her head and helps Bim push his shoulders back and chin up, maybe fixes the eyeliner because Dark didn’t even get his waterline, dammit. She’s one of the first to know, but stands back and watches the rest of them be terrorized, even walking up to “Bim” and forcing him to have a normal conversation with her. Bim and Dark watch her laugh at them at the end of it all, even Dark’s aura dumbfounded. They swear that Kathryn has a magic all her own.

BONUS:

-Anti glitches into the office because the Googles have texted him that there’s something he just _has_  to see. Anti hangs back, shadowed, watching “Dark’s” aura misbehave around him, and “Bim” is just a _little_  too happy today. When the realization hits, he laughs himself hoarse, until “Bim” pulls him aside to chat. All Anti can do is giggle at the stupid grin Dark has plastered on his face, and Bim’s eyeliner. A part of him envies it, that they can have this together, be a family, live together, joke together. Another part of him wants to destroy them from the inside out. 


End file.
